[rec] Theory is more fun than Literature (at least some of the time)

[kwritten]

This is an American Cultural Studies // Literary Theory rec-post. This is not - by any means - an all-inclusive list of the subject. In fact, it's pretty narrow in scope as my research in Uni focused primarily on the 19thC (why I'm writing a thesis on contemporary fandom is a question I still ask myself on a daily fucking basis because I do NOT

Comments

[belecrivain]

" To claim that sexual difference is more fundamental than racial difference is effectively to assume that sexual difference is white sexual difference, and that whiteness is not a form of racial difference." You are going to have to break that one down for me, as my reading finds it pretty repulsive.

[kwritten]

She's talking about how the color line and the gender line are related, basically. She's saying that anyone who says that sex is a more fundamental difference than racial difference is basically saying that there is no difference between a Black woman and a White woman because they are both women first and racial difference is subservient to any other form of difference.

Or - she is also saying that a Black Gay Male's experience will be different than a White Gay Male's experience and claiming that there is no racial difference is wrong.

This particular passage is in her chapter on Nella Larson's text Passing which is about a black female who "passes" as white. In her discussion of the main female character's sexual identity, Butler is careful NOT to assume that sexual identity trumps racial identity

[belecrivain]

The "identity" part was what was missing; I read sexual difference as *biological* difference, so either she was arguing that there was no biological differences between the sexes, which is folly (not that three isn't a spectrum of differences, and the binary categorization has its limits, but), or that there *was* biological differences between *races* to equal those of distinctive genitalia, which, no.

[kwritten]

Actually one of her arguments is that we infer more "biological" difference than there actually is.

Her theory of Performativity is that bodies do not perform gender and are constantly contesting it. Which is a highly fascinating theory and I've written many an essay that takes it into account. ((Basically that there's no such thing as "women are shaped like an hourglass" which I think Sungjong has made fully clear.))

No really though - psychoanalysis theory is not generally going to talk about biology. Except for when it does. IGNORE THAT STATEMENT! ((Because the way we define things changes how we think about things, etc etc. Semiotics theory really fucks with the universe.))

[upupa_epops]

THANK YOU SO, SO MUCH, YOU'RE MY HEROOOOOOOOOOOOO

Of course now I'm crying over not having access to a proper library, but push comes to shove, I'll use this once I've moved to a more friendly place. And there is some stuff I can read even now!

<3333333333333333333333333333333333

[kwritten]

There's tons of stuff here for you to read and I can always find you more if you want it :)

[ever_neutral]

THIS IS A VERITABLE FEAST.

MY ENTIRE BRAIN IS CRYING.

/rolls around in pools of my bloody tears

[kwritten]

Please roll around in the lovely words and let me know what you thought about the things and what was your favorite

AND OMG I AM SUCH A STAN FOR BRAINS SERIOUSLY

[eilowyn]

I just ordered Essentials of the Theories of Fiction because I needed a good theory book (because my school completely ignores theory), and because Duplessis has such bearing on my work, and I realized I used Halberstam's essay on Dracula (actually I think it was the book that came out of the essay?) in that Blackness in TVD paper! And yes, she is adorable.